For the sake of whatever you turn to for guidance and decency, for what's good and right, pleeeaaassse let the poor thing up for air...
AIR!!! I SAID AIR!!! Yes, air, breath, spirit, life ~ and airs and what awful things some folks do to them, and what's good too.
I don't know about you, but I love airs, and that includes when someone is singing. But here, this particular harangue, the interest and intended focus is on 'singing', or not, an air with an instrument - pipes, strings, reeds, etc. This I also love, when it is handled tastefully and with understanding and care. Lately, however, I keep coming across situations where the 'taste' is questionable, where there's just too damned much ketchup, mollasses or those damned Scotch Bonnet chillies thrown into the mix. AND, why isn't an air enough? Why, too often in my mind, do folks feel it necessary to turn to the cheap and hackneyed way to goose into a tempo change, to go into hyperdrive, usually reels. Worse OTT is when the poor air is tortured to start with, stretched on the rack till it screams and then WHOOSH! - and quickly escaping and forgetting about the dirge as we go la-la into reel time...
Even the very capable and talented get caught up in this. Is this similar in some way to those singers who give too much attention to vibrato and holding an open vowel note to the point of acceptable redicule and laughter, exaggerating both the WAH-WAH-WAH-WAH-WAH~ and the AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA~... I think I'm starting to feel seasick...
Whatever happened to the old maxim to learn an air and ways with it, if possible, from a singer? Not speaking of some of the laughable attempts, I can't think of any of the older singers that WAH-WAHHed their way through a song, in Irish or English, or held a note for so long you felt like tossing something into that opening to bring the pain to an end...
The topic is 'the playing of airs' - dreadfully and otherwise...
I like airs in moderation of course
What I hate is backing on an air . Yup thats correct trying to accompany someone playing who is imitating an unaccompanied singer .
Whats even is stranger is when someone requests this . ( yes I am talking about you, Mr S Tansey but you are not alone alas ). Most of these players never repeat the tune exactly the same way twice and are lost in the music to an extent beyond that of usual jigs reels etc there is nothing wrong in this and is part of the form however to accompany such people needs telepathy and to expect it off the cuff in sessions is unrealistic and the resulting music detracts from the sublty of the tune and ornimentation.
I would love to be able to play Air's right, I tend to rush them, and have even been told to hold note's and let the, Slow Air Breath.
But I totally agree with what your saying here...
< too much attention to vibrato and holding an open vowel note to the point of acceptable redicule and laughter, >
And I like to say more on this subject but, I have to go now to a session and play a lot of Reel's : (
But if I have to play an Air, I shall surely think about what you said above Danni.
jim,,,
FWIW:
I suspect, as I believe I have posted here before, that there are two basic motives for hanging it all out there solo (or duet) on an air or a song.
1. Dig THIS.
The artist is SHARING something they really like, a tune or song that seems to them worth letting others hear, and enjoy if they agree with their taste. Usually, there is a sensitivity and respect for a fine piece of music indicated in how they 'perfporm", be it a session or a TV show. For the melody, there is interpretation and some elaboration, but the tune is still evident in these little flights of creativity. Not stagnant cloning off the dots, but still a bit of restraint.
2.Dig ME.
The artist is taking this opportunity to truck out their party piece and strut their stuff for all to marvel and wonder at. The tune or song is merely the vehicle which they can now exploit for their fifteen minutes of fame.
The artist usually is performing something which, despite the logic of choosing something familiar and well-honed for a performing solo or duet, is now actually dead to them. The singer no longer hears or considers the words, they have become merely syllables to play as notes on their platinum vocal chords, or, for the instrumentalist, the tune is merely the frame for elaboration and decoration.
Love of music vs. love of self?
Playing it straight or showing off?
I believe we are, all of us who play in front of others, balanced somewhere between our love of the art and the demands of our egos. The differences may lie in who might be in better balance at any given moment. Sadly, yet another aesthetic point.
Folks should never join in on airs, even accompanists, unless that participation is worked out in advance. An air should be able to breath, and its rhythm should be fluid.
Some folks, though, take that to an extreme, and instead of being fluid, the rhythm becomes erratic, and the ornaments and noodles overtake the melody.
And the player should serve the tune, not use the tune as a springboard for showing off.
I have little or no awareness of sean-nos singing, but am the first to admit that airs can easily be over-done. A bit like the singing of the national anthem, in that respect. A pretty wide berth as far as what people consider tasteful.
As for wind-ups, I actually used to like them as a kid. Something about the calm before the battle and charging blindly ahead into something fraught with danger and excitement?
As I've gotten older I have a new-found respect for the air. I'm usually pretty docile when it comes to wind-ups, but it's easy to get caught up in them.
Sadly, I've given mine away, I liked it that much. But I plan to replace it. It seems I sometimes can't win, if I don't like it I give it away, and if I'm very fond of it I give it away, though my wife is trying to curb the latter tendancy...
i think playing airs is a very personal thing. i like to play an air. for myself. but it's kind of intimate, isn't it? not sure i want to be that intimate with just anybody...
but i imagine if i knew more about it, i might learn to love it. it is just that at the present, hearing other people let it all hang out usually makes me squirm, and not in a good way.
i will check out the recommended links above. but it scares me...
At my local session there is an excellent piper who unfortunately indulges himself with airs. They seem to turn out as if Ornette Coleman played the pipes. My solution is to (unobtrusively) remove my recently-acquired hearing aids. My ears don't suffer and his feelings aren't hurt. Bless him!
And an important thing about songs is they have words. I would like to be able to understand them. I would like to feel the singer understands them. I would like to feel the singer has an opinion on what the song is about and is trying to communicate that meaning.
But mostly I would like to go and play some tunes.
I love the air "Silent Night". I'm sure I'll hear it a number of times
over the next few weeks. Most singers will have the common sense and decency to do this melody simply and peacefully. Unfortunately, every year, I expect to hear at least one singer somewhere, anywhere, on the radio, or at a concert, who will attempt to destroy it beyond recognition in the name of artistic expression and vocal virtuousity.
c, I'm trying to figure out whether the tune in the title (all those A's) is a jig, reel, polka, or whatever. Anyway, it looks like it's incomplete.
I think I'll go and lie down.
Trevor lad, that's just the lead-in... The 'H' as in German notation, but the 'I's & 'R's are just for the hell of it, throat clearing as in "HARUMPH!" and other such gutterals...
Piece, back awhile, is that an echo I hear? I've been distracted so haven't had the time yet to chase up your U-Tube links, but I will...
1.) Seosamh O hEanaí / Joe - "Cunla" - a comic, silly, or nonsense song, sometimes bawdy, to the tune of a well known session jig (the Frieze Breeches).
2.) Trevor Stewart, uilleann piper from Belfast, playing two jigs
3.) Darach Ó Catháin - "Óró sé do bheatha 'bhaile"
Enjoyable enough listens but not a slow air amongst the lot...
Can anyone recommend a good sean nos recording of Port na bPucai? I’ve learned the tune from recordings by Ronan Browne, Davy Spillane and Kevin Glackin, and Noel Hill and Tony MacMahon, but would prefer to have a vocal to pattern my playing after. One of the biggest challenges I face in playing certain airs decently is having a proper understanding of the song on which the air is based.
For what it’s worth, I don’t think sessions are the be-all end-all of traditional Irish music. Sometimes sessions (or: some sessions, sometimes) are not terribly friendly to certain aspects of the music, like song and slow airs. Still, at home or with a small group of friends, when the time is right, I love an air.
Also--do you count O’Carolan pieces as airs? A session I go to plays a few of them and everyone plays together. Some nights it’s fun others it’s a bloody racket.
Port na bPucai may not be a song. I could well be wrong but hazily remember Ronan Browne's spiel at a gig, before he played it, was along the lines of the composer hearing humpback whales singing whilst out fishing and feeling inspired by the whales to write that tune. Buy a whale song CD, perhaps?
The whale spiel is usually attributed to O'Riada, who most likely arranged the air into it's present shape (compare it to how the original fiddler played it on he Blasket sound recording).
Seamus Heaney's version of the story:
The Given Note
On the most westerly Blasket
In a dry-stone hut
He got this air out of the night.
Strange noises were heard
By others who followed, bits of a tune
Coming in on loud weather
Though nothing like melody.
He blamed their fingers and ear
As unpractised, their fiddling easy
For he had gone alone into the island
And brought back the whole thing.
The house throbbed like his full violin.
So whether he calls it spirit music
Or not, I don't care. He took it
Out of wind off mid-Atlantic.
Still he maintains, from nowhere.
It comes off the bow gravely,
Rephrases itself into the air.
Seamus Heaney
from the collection 'Opened Ground, Poems 1966-1996', published by Faber and Faber 1998
Still, with slow airs it is best to 'speak' the melody, to tell its story, the feeling of it, as if speaking or singing it, not tooooooo damned slow, not as a dirge, but even a good dirge shouldn't be 'dead' slow...
Do the guidelines which apply to ornamentation for instrumental tunes also apply to solo singing such as "airs" and "sean-nos" singing?
Or when someone who is playing an instrument which requires lung power such as a flute and they take a breath, do they pause for air at approximately the same place as someone who is singing a solo?
Yes it does irritate me when someone varies a song so much that you cannot recognize the original under or behind all of the ornamentation and/or variations they are adding to the song until it collapses under its own weight.
My limited understanding (such as it is) tells me that in this genre of music, when you singing solo, you are supposed to stay close to the original melody instead of going off into your own world of your imagination--or even another planet entirely.
AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~ :-P
AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
For the sake of whatever you turn to for guidance and decency, for what's good and right, pleeeaaassse let the poor thing up for air...
AIR!!! I SAID AIR!!! Yes, air, breath, spirit, life ~ and airs and what awful things some folks do to them, and what's good too.
I don't know about you, but I love airs, and that includes when someone is singing. But here, this particular harangue, the interest and intended focus is on 'singing', or not, an air with an instrument - pipes, strings, reeds, etc. This I also love, when it is handled tastefully and with understanding and care. Lately, however, I keep coming across situations where the 'taste' is questionable, where there's just too damned much ketchup, mollasses or those damned Scotch Bonnet chillies thrown into the mix. AND, why isn't an air enough? Why, too often in my mind, do folks feel it necessary to turn to the cheap and hackneyed way to goose into a tempo change, to go into hyperdrive, usually reels. Worse OTT is when the poor air is tortured to start with, stretched on the rack till it screams and then WHOOSH! - and quickly escaping and forgetting about the dirge as we go la-la into reel time...
Even the very capable and talented get caught up in this. Is this similar in some way to those singers who give too much attention to vibrato and holding an open vowel note to the point of acceptable redicule and laughter, exaggerating both the WAH-WAH-WAH-WAH-WAH~ and the AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA~... I think I'm starting to feel seasick...
Whatever happened to the old maxim to learn an air and ways with it, if possible, from a singer? Not speaking of some of the laughable attempts, I can't think of any of the older singers that WAH-WAHHed their way through a song, in Irish or English, or held a note for so long you felt like tossing something into that opening to bring the pain to an end...
The topic is 'the playing of airs' - dreadfully and otherwise...
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by ceolachan
Share your pains and your pleasures...
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by ceolachan
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
I like airs in moderation of course
What I hate is backing on an air . Yup thats correct trying to accompany someone playing who is imitating an unaccompanied singer .
Whats even is stranger is when someone requests this . ( yes I am talking about you, Mr S Tansey but you are not alone alas ). Most of these players never repeat the tune exactly the same way twice and are lost in the music to an extent beyond that of usual jigs reels etc there is nothing wrong in this and is part of the form however to accompany such people needs telepathy and to expect it off the cuff in sessions is unrealistic and the resulting music detracts from the sublty of the tune and ornimentation.
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by bazouki dave
No worries BD if it's a synthesizzzzzzzzzzerrrrrrr-mmmmm...
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by ceolachan
And 'Phantom of the Opera' chords-zzzzzzz...OHMMMMM!!!
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by ceolachan
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
I would love to be able to play Air's right, I tend to rush them, and have even been told to hold note's and let the, Slow Air Breath.
But I totally agree with what your saying here...
< too much attention to vibrato and holding an open vowel note to the point of acceptable redicule and laughter, >
And I like to say more on this subject but, I have to go now to a session and play a lot of Reel's : (
But if I have to play an Air, I shall surely think about what you said above Danni.
jim,,,
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by FIDDLE4
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
Sing 'em Jim... It don't matter how rough as long as your passion for it is clear and not smeared, constipated or claggy...
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by ceolachan
Plumber anyone?
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by ceolachan
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
FWIW:
I suspect, as I believe I have posted here before, that there are two basic motives for hanging it all out there solo (or duet) on an air or a song.
1. Dig THIS.
The artist is SHARING something they really like, a tune or song that seems to them worth letting others hear, and enjoy if they agree with their taste. Usually, there is a sensitivity and respect for a fine piece of music indicated in how they 'perfporm", be it a session or a TV show. For the melody, there is interpretation and some elaboration, but the tune is still evident in these little flights of creativity. Not stagnant cloning off the dots, but still a bit of restraint.
2.Dig ME.
The artist is taking this opportunity to truck out their party piece and strut their stuff for all to marvel and wonder at. The tune or song is merely the vehicle which they can now exploit for their fifteen minutes of fame.
The artist usually is performing something which, despite the logic of choosing something familiar and well-honed for a performing solo or duet, is now actually dead to them. The singer no longer hears or considers the words, they have become merely syllables to play as notes on their platinum vocal chords, or, for the instrumentalist, the tune is merely the frame for elaboration and decoration.
Love of music vs. love of self?
Playing it straight or showing off?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pxDmAdozxk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWwQ3ukjA2M
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AFRCWg_kOc&feature=related
I believe we are, all of us who play in front of others, balanced somewhere between our love of the art and the demands of our egos. The differences may lie in who might be in better balance at any given moment. Sadly, yet another aesthetic point.
Cheers, all.
(Is my two cents up?)
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by Piece
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
I miss the 80s - 2nd video: person enjoying a cigarette behind the piper as he starts his set -
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by Reeds Munson
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
I love slow airs (and all the other sorts of airs). I can play the ones I can play. I can't play the rest.
Do I get bubblegum now?
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by ethical blend
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
Folks should never join in on airs, even accompanists, unless that participation is worked out in advance. An air should be able to breath, and its rhythm should be fluid.
Some folks, though, take that to an extreme, and instead of being fluid, the rhythm becomes erratic, and the ornaments and noodles overtake the melody.
And the player should serve the tune, not use the tune as a springboard for showing off.
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by AlBrown
The remedy....................
http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display/4070
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by Kenny
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
I have little or no awareness of sean-nos singing, but am the first to admit that airs can easily be over-done. A bit like the singing of the national anthem, in that respect. A pretty wide berth as far as what people consider tasteful.
As for wind-ups, I actually used to like them as a kid. Something about the calm before the battle and charging blindly ahead into something fraught with danger and excitement?
As I've gotten older I have a new-found respect for the air. I'm usually pretty docile when it comes to wind-ups, but it's easy to get caught up in them.
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by mrkelahan
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
As Kenny has done, it is good to offer up appreciated ways with such things. Here's just one, by way of the flute, and a nice mix of tune forms too ~
"Conal Ó'Gráda: Cnoc Bui"
http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display/3063
Sadly, I've given mine away, I liked it that much. But I plan to replace it. It seems I sometimes can't win, if I don't like it I give it away, and if I'm very fond of it I give it away, though my wife is trying to curb the latter tendancy...
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by ceolachan
~ with some success. I've stopped giving away instruments...
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by ceolachan
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
i think playing airs is a very personal thing. i like to play an air. for myself. but it's kind of intimate, isn't it? not sure i want to be that intimate with just anybody...
but i imagine if i knew more about it, i might learn to love it. it is just that at the present, hearing other people let it all hang out usually makes me squirm, and not in a good way.
i will check out the recommended links above. but it scares me...
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by full measure
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
At my local session there is an excellent piper who unfortunately indulges himself with airs. They seem to turn out as if Ornette Coleman played the pipes. My solution is to (unobtrusively) remove my recently-acquired hearing aids. My ears don't suffer and his feelings aren't hurt. Bless him!
# Posted on December 10th 2011 by Ebor_fiddler
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
Thanks for the chuckle's worth you two - FM & Ebor, great stuff...
# Posted on December 11th 2011 by ceolachan
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
And an important thing about songs is they have words. I would like to be able to understand them. I would like to feel the singer understands them. I would like to feel the singer has an opinion on what the song is about and is trying to communicate that meaning.
But mostly I would like to go and play some tunes.
# Posted on December 11th 2011 by c.g.
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
I love the air "Silent Night". I'm sure I'll hear it a number of times
over the next few weeks. Most singers will have the common sense and decency to do this melody simply and peacefully. Unfortunately, every year, I expect to hear at least one singer somewhere, anywhere, on the radio, or at a concert, who will attempt to destroy it beyond recognition in the name of artistic expression and vocal virtuousity.
# Posted on December 11th 2011 by halfwaythere
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
c, I'm trying to figure out whether the tune in the title (all those A's) is a jig, reel, polka, or whatever. Anyway, it looks like it's incomplete.
I think I'll go and lie down.
# Posted on December 11th 2011 by Trevor Jennings
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
Trevor lad, that's just the lead-in... The 'H' as in German notation, but the 'I's & 'R's are just for the hell of it, throat clearing as in "HARUMPH!" and other such gutterals...
Piece, back awhile, is that an echo I hear? I've been distracted so haven't had the time yet to chase up your U-Tube links, but I will...
Another collection of airs for consideration ~
"The Coolin" - another Globestyle Topic compilation
http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display/1430
# Posted on December 11th 2011 by ceolachan
Piece's offerings ~
1.) Seosamh O hEanaí / Joe - "Cunla" - a comic, silly, or nonsense song, sometimes bawdy, to the tune of a well known session jig (the Frieze Breeches).
2.) Trevor Stewart, uilleann piper from Belfast, playing two jigs
3.) Darach Ó Catháin - "Óró sé do bheatha 'bhaile"
Enjoyable enough listens but not a slow air amongst the lot...
# Posted on December 12th 2011 by ceolachan
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
Can anyone recommend a good sean nos recording of Port na bPucai? I’ve learned the tune from recordings by Ronan Browne, Davy Spillane and Kevin Glackin, and Noel Hill and Tony MacMahon, but would prefer to have a vocal to pattern my playing after. One of the biggest challenges I face in playing certain airs decently is having a proper understanding of the song on which the air is based.
For what it’s worth, I don’t think sessions are the be-all end-all of traditional Irish music. Sometimes sessions (or: some sessions, sometimes) are not terribly friendly to certain aspects of the music, like song and slow airs. Still, at home or with a small group of friends, when the time is right, I love an air.
Also--do you count O’Carolan pieces as airs? A session I go to plays a few of them and everyone plays together. Some nights it’s fun others it’s a bloody racket.
# Posted on December 12th 2011 by fidkid
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
Port na bPucai may not be a song. I could well be wrong but hazily remember Ronan Browne's spiel at a gig, before he played it, was along the lines of the composer hearing humpback whales singing whilst out fishing and feeling inspired by the whales to write that tune. Buy a whale song CD, perhaps?
# Posted on December 12th 2011 by DrSilverSpear
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
I've heard that story too, The Silver Spear. If true, the lyrics, if any, probably sound like this thread's title
# Posted on December 12th 2011 by fidkid
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
The whale spiel is usually attributed to O'Riada, who most likely arranged the air into it's present shape (compare it to how the original fiddler played it on he Blasket sound recording).
Seamus Heaney's version of the story:
The Given Note
On the most westerly Blasket
In a dry-stone hut
He got this air out of the night.
Strange noises were heard
By others who followed, bits of a tune
Coming in on loud weather
Though nothing like melody.
He blamed their fingers and ear
As unpractised, their fiddling easy
For he had gone alone into the island
And brought back the whole thing.
The house throbbed like his full violin.
So whether he calls it spirit music
Or not, I don't care. He took it
Out of wind off mid-Atlantic.
Still he maintains, from nowhere.
It comes off the bow gravely,
Rephrases itself into the air.
Seamus Heaney
from the collection 'Opened Ground, Poems 1966-1996', published by Faber and Faber 1998
# Posted on December 12th 2011 by Prof. Prlwytzkofski
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
Where can I find that original fiddler version, Prof. Prlwytzkofski? Would love to hear it.
# Posted on December 12th 2011 by fidkid
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display/2664
Track 10.
# Posted on December 12th 2011 by Weejie
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
Séan Cheaist Ó Catháin's version is on this CD:
http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display/2664
# Posted on December 12th 2011 by Prof. Prlwytzkofski
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
x post there.
# Posted on December 12th 2011 by Prof. Prlwytzkofski
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
Thank you both.
# Posted on December 12th 2011 by fidkid
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
Still, with slow airs it is best to 'speak' the melody, to tell its story, the feeling of it, as if speaking or singing it, not tooooooo damned slow, not as a dirge, but even a good dirge shouldn't be 'dead' slow...
# Posted on December 12th 2011 by ceolachan
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
The young Chieftains did the best airs instrumentally back in the 60s and 70s, but they tended to shriek a bit too much on the pipes
# Posted on December 12th 2011 by darach
Re: AAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaAAAaaaaaaiiiiirrr-rr--r---gh ~
Do the guidelines which apply to ornamentation for instrumental tunes also apply to solo singing such as "airs" and "sean-nos" singing?
Or when someone who is playing an instrument which requires lung power such as a flute and they take a breath, do they pause for air at approximately the same place as someone who is singing a solo?
Yes it does irritate me when someone varies a song so much that you cannot recognize the original under or behind all of the ornamentation and/or variations they are adding to the song until it collapses under its own weight.
My limited understanding (such as it is) tells me that in this genre of music, when you singing solo, you are supposed to stay close to the original melody instead of going off into your own world of your imagination--or even another planet entirely.
Laurence
Laurence
# Posted on December 13th 2011 by fauxcelt